


Something Eternal

by NeverKnightfire



Series: The Heart’s Proximity [3]
Category: Hazbin Hotel (Web Series)
Genre: Alastor has a heart, Alastor the magical mad scientist, Alcohol, Awkwardness, Dorks in Love, Drinking, Fluff, Getting Together, Husk has a heart, M/M, Pining, Protective Alastor (Hazbin Hotel), husk curses, nihilistic thoughts, staying together
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-20
Updated: 2020-11-20
Packaged: 2021-03-10 04:49:17
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,160
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27637775
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NeverKnightfire/pseuds/NeverKnightfire
Summary: The Extermination day was coming soon, and with it came the same questions that crawled out of his mind every year since that fateful day in the bar.If you didn’t have events to mark  your calendar, Eternity made each year vanish in a blink of Time’s rushing wings.Husk was one of the fortunate ones.(Takes place during the time skip in Failures)
Relationships: Alastor/Husk (Hazbin Hotel)
Series: The Heart’s Proximity [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2028173
Comments: 13
Kudos: 105





	Something Eternal

The problem with Hell was that it was eternal. 

Well sure, the concept was easy enough to understand. Ya done fucked up topside, and whoever the great and holy asshat was that weighed the sins of your soul decided that you weren't up to code for the Upstairs. So, Hell it was. Forever. Or until you pissed off someone who had access to one of those demon-slaying god-weapons, at least. 

Before was finite. A countdown. A calendar whose pages blew away in the wind of time and then were gone. No second chances. No do-overs. 

Eternity was a great, gaping expanse of nothing so far as time was concerned. Time busied herself in the Before, turning minutes into hours into years and speeding them past with a breathless exuberance that turned newborn babes into corpses in the blink of an eye. Time cared nothing for After, Husk thought to himself as he slumped against his bar table. 

He was just the right level of almost-drunk to feel philosophical, and all of eternity's endless cycle stretched before his wandering mind. The days and nights of Hell were a falsehood, a simulation for the benefit of the newlydeads and an amusement for the eternal ones. 

For the average demon, Eternity spread its wings over the infinite and numbed them to the notion of Time’s passing. There was, for them, one exception to the grinding nothingness. One concession that was made to the progressive March to the End. 

The only event on their calendar was the once-a-year event of the Cleansing, or as it was more popularly known, Extermination Day. It was coming up very soon, slithering closer with every hour, preparing to seize the unwary. 

The stretch of repetitive days meant that it was far too easy to be caught off-guard when that day arrived. If you had nothing else, no other events of import to remind you of the passing hours, it snuck up on you.

Husk knew that for a fact, having awakened in an alley one year on that very day as a larger demon fell on top of him, dying from a case of holy metal poisoning. It had been a shock, and only being too confused and hungover to make a sound had saved him from the business end of an angelic harpoon himself. The state he'd been in at the time had kept him uncertain afterwards about whether it was an occasion to rejoice over or mourn. 

What was there after ending your death, after all?

Theories abounded about what happened to the perma-dead. Former humans, hellborn natives, they all had a notion about what happened to severed souls after they were cut free of their immortal shells. If anyone in Hell actually knew the answer, it would be Lucifer himself. Fuck if anyone would ever get a straight answer out of that ringmaster of bullshit, though. He might tell the truth, but the fact was that even if he did, who would even believe him? 

They didn't call the snake-faced fuck "The Author of all Lies" for nothing. 

Husk had spent the next several years' worth of Extermination Days trying to sort through his near-perma-death experience in a series of bars. He was far from the only sinner in Hell who turned to alcohol to drown out the murderous choirs descending upon the Hellscape. 

Just like Before, people flocked to the public drinking house for three main reasons. One was boredom. Not likely on this particular day, where death rained from the skies on glowing goddamn wings. Two was celebration. There were always a few giddy bastards who were elatedly marking using the angels to finish off some other, less fortunate soul. 

Husk had always tended, in those days, to end up in the third category: depression. 

Whether you were down because you mourned the severing of someone else, or the fact you hadn't yet joined the ranks of the eternally silenced, there was always a downbeat crowd to keep company with on Extermination Day. Whether you wanted to drown your sorrows in silence or complain that the fuckers had learned to swim with a companion, there was always room for one more in the company of the eternally damned and drunk. 

On one such day at the bar, Husk had looked up to see the face of a fellow sinner, a fur-covered monstrosity not terribly unlike himself. The other sinner had pushed through the layers of cheap, evil-smelling beer she was drinking to look him in the eye. Her vision was cloudy, mouth twitching in uncertainty as she spoke. 

"What do you think is the... the point?" she'd asked him in a quavering voice, striped tail wavering uncertainly behind her. Some kind of cat or something, he’d assumed. 

"The point?" he'd scoffed bitterly. "There's no fuckin' point. There just _is_. S' how it's always been. S' how it'll always be, I reckon. No point. No logic. Jus' a fuckin' shitshow of sufferin' stupid shit." He'd raised his glass, mindful not to drop ash from his cigar in it. "Welcome t' Hell, ya dumb fuck. S' a goddamned trainwreck wit' only one way out." 

The demoness beside him at the counter had frowned through his words, shaking her head with a deliberate slowness. "No, no, no. Not Hell. The angels. This... w-wholesale slaughter. What's the point of it? They say it's to um... stave off overpopulation, right? Why would Heaven give a crap about that? Wouldn't being overpop- popu-" She smacked her head with the hand that wasn't guarding her drink. "Crowded! Wouldn't it being overcrowded just make it more uh... Helllish?" 

Husk's head had hurt. He'd briefly considered breaking his bottle of Scotch over his own head and hoping for some blessed nothingness for a while. 

"Look lady, I ain't th' kinda demon who's still lookin' fer answers," he'd slurred back at her. "Th' fact is, it don't even matter none why. Why's fer th' livin' t' ask. We ain't got that kinda luxury down here." 

The short demon had turned to face the door at that. Her brow was furrowed, folding into the fur of her forehead to make stark lines out of the color bands in the hairs. "Souls are valuable," she insisted. "Why waste them? Why punish them in the fir-first place, if there's no possible way out?" She pronounced the words slowly, carefully enunciating each syllable. "If there's nothing for them but erasure, why keep them contained in Hell at all? Why not erase them immediately, and be done with it? Are- Are they even being destroyed? Or just... taken away?”

"Go ask an angel," he'd suggested. He was too caught up in the pounding behind his eyes that felt like a railroad spike being wedged backwards through his skull to care about the question or the asker. When he'd looked up again, the short demoness had been gone. He'd never let himself wonder what had happened to her. It cost too much to care about what happened to other demons. Better to keep your care for yourself, and let the other bozos sort their own shit out. 

He couldn't remember the face of that other demon anymore, but that conversation... It, he remembered with startling clarity. Sometimes those questions revealed that they'd burrowed down into his skull, taking up residence in dens deep within his brain. They'd pop out when he was the least prepared for them, and he'd find himself wondering. 

Why was for Before. Why was for the living. There were no whys once you'd kicked off the mortal coil, he reminded himself sternly. He found himself staring down the shot of vodka that had been left for him by the bartender. If he glared hard enough, maybe he could convince it to stop being a weird flavor that he had never intended to try. 

Goddamn kids these days had already ruined music, now they were ruining alcohol, turning it into candy-flavored bullshit instead of learning how to appreciate a good drink! He shook his head. Fighting the erosion of good taste was as pointless an endeavor as asking the void that hung between Heaven and Hell "why" instead of getting on with one's afterlife. 

The sounds of the bar faded, and Husk was startled from his staring contest with the forgotten shot glass. He'd been pulled somewhere, drawn by the threads of magic that Alastor had woven between them. Husk found himself in his own home, sitting at his old kitchen table as Alastor hummed an upbeat ditty in front of the stove. 

A warmth blossomed in his soul at the sight. That had been then, and this was now, and he had pages of reasons now to note the passing days thanks to his Al. Most of them wonderful, but the memory of a few made him suspicious of why he’d been seized from his brooding.

"The fuck're you doing?" Husk asked as the Radio Demon spun to face him with a 1000 watt grin. 

"A most fascinating question!" Alastor guffawed in time with the laugh track that spawned from the air around him. "Tell me, what do you think that I'm doing, my dear?" 

Husk's gaze wandered back to the stove, where a pot large enough to hold an entire demon was bubbling away atop the multiple flaming burners. "Looks like you're cooking some dumb fuck in my house." 

Alastor and his laugh track cackled anew at the comment. "No no, my dear, nothing quite so... culinary. What you see is the result of a bit of investigative herbalism. A little experiment in the manipulation of magic!" 

"And it needs to happen in my kitchen... because...?" 

The deer demon made an amused flutter of a noise, pacing over to pinch Husk's face and muss the fur back and forth. "Oh, my dear Husker! It needs to happen in your kitchen because it is directly related to shoring up the safety and well-being of your domicile! And before you ask, that is to help ensure the safety and well-being of YOU!" 

Husk took a moment to appreciate how Alastor's hair was fastened back away from his face with an array of bobby pins before he answered. "You coulda asked before you jumped right into this, Al. What if I didn't want a cauldron of magic garbage boiling in the middle of the afternoon?" 

"Poppycock!" Alastor laughed, "I'm soon done, as soon as I add a last ingredient or two, this fusion enchantment will be ready to pour!" 

"Pour," Husk echoed, his feathery brows raising at the word. "Wait, fusion enchantment? You're mixing experimental magical bullshit in my house?!" 

"You worry far too much, Husker!" Alastor smirked, picking up a small bottle from the counter beside the stove. "I've been mixing magics longer than you've been dead, darling. I think you'll find that I know what I'm doing." 

One drop of lemongrass extract later, the mixture on the stove was both purple and boiling violently over. Husk picked up his shot glass of vodka and stepped up onto his chair to watch the drama unfold as Alastor hopped madly about, trying not to get scalded. "Turn off the heat," Husk suggested, sipping on his neglected drink with a grimace. 

Alastor screeched something in an unearthly language that made Husk's ears twist before porting them both out of the house. From the safety of the lawn, they watched as Husk's small house dissolved in a mountain of foaming, violet goo. 

"Fuck," Husk muttered as the roofline vanished. 

"Fuck, indeed," Alastor agreed. His tone sounded so stunned and defeated that Husk nearly felt sorry for the guy. 

Almost. 

"Here. Drink this," he offered, pushing the shot glass into the hand that Al wasn't using to pinch the bridge of his nose in embarrassed exasperation. 

Alastor accepted the glass and threw back the contents, spitting the flavored liquid out almost as soon as it hit his tongue. "What in the name of all that is unholy was THAT?" the Radio Demon demanded, chucking the glass in the direction of the melting house. 

"Vodka," Husk retorted with a smirk. "Fruity cereal flavored, I'm told. Very popular with the youngsters these days, I guess." 

"Your youngsters, honestly. This truly IS Hell," Alastor growled, forgoing decorum to wipe his mouth on his sleeve. "What has the underworld come to? Vodka isn't meant to HAVE a flavor!" 

The cat demon stared at the still hissing gelatinous heap that had been his house. It was settling strangely, like a jello mold that had been left out in the summer heat. "Houses ain't meant to turn to jelly, either, so it's a big day all around, Al." The sad, slimy mess let out a pitiful gloopy noise of what might have been agreement. 

"You'll stay with me until I can fix this," Alastor announced, pulling off the chemical-repelling apron he'd been wearing and tossing it atop the goo that was now eating its way into the ground. "There. It's settled. Give me a list of everything you'd like reconstituted and I'll see that your belongings are returned in better than new condition." 

Husk kicked a rock into the widening hole. "And just how damned long do you think that'll be, exactly? And hey- whaddaya mean by MY youngsters!?" His tail threshed the sparse grass as he sneered back at the thoughtful Alastor. "I ain't got nothing to do with the kids these days and their damn fool ideas about flavored alcohol!" 

"Well, you're hardly doing anything to stop them, now are you?" Alastor retorted, throwing an arm around Husk and teleporting them to his own home. "Now that we have that settled, I'll see to supper. Things always look better after a good meal!" Nodding in satisfaction, Alastor strode purposefully towards his own kitchen. 

Husk spun to watch him leave, indecisive confusion pulling at his heart. "Al... What's this about? Why'd you do this?"

The Radio Demon paused but did not turn to face Husk. It was as if his whole person became starched, blank and two-dimensional. "Why? Why is a dangerous question, darling." 

"There's no why in Hell," the cat demon muttered. "That's what we all say." Alastor nodded, his back ramrod straight and shoulders stiff. When he did not speak, Husk frowned. "Day after tomorrow’s the Extermination Day, isn't it?" Another silent nod was his answer. "You didn't jello my place on purpose, did you?" A slow, shameful head shake in the negative. 

"Oh, goddamn it, Al. Stop acting like a kid trying to keep out of trouble and talk to me. What went wrong?" 

"It would have been fine, if I hadn't pushed that last little bit," Alastor sighed, his voice a rough, uneven whisper in the silence of the room. "Everything else, I had checked and rechecked. I had made certain of all of it. And then? Then a last-minute bit of inspiration! And to think, a single drop was enough to bring things to this. Darling, you must certainly hate me for this." Alastor's shoulders sagged under the admission of guilt, his ears wilting back to pin against his head. 

"I don't hate ya, Al. I'm annoyed as shit, but I don't hate ya. Just... talk to me. Why did you do this?” 

Alastor's head rose a little at that, his ears cautiously lifting. "Why is such a loaded question," he muttered to himself before speaking up properly again. "Do you ever wonder, Husker? What happens to the souls that the angels reap from Hell?" 

The fur along Husk's spine rose at the query, the familiar light haze of alcoholic buzz lifting from his tired mind at the words. "I- Well, something like that," he admitted, refusing to think back again to that stranger in the long-ago bar and their damned questions. 

"It is a question which has haunted me every day since I first came to realize what had happened to me when I took possession of your heart," Alastor replied. His shoulders rose and an electric expectancy came with it, sizzling through the air between them. 

“I am not willing to find out. Once, I regarded the question like the gateway to an even greater adventure than this has been. But now...” The Radio Demon seemed to shrink in on himself as he took a trembling breath. “Now, it is a notion that fills me with greater dread than I have ever conceived of.”

Husk slowly walked toward the other demon, steps as slow and quiet as if he was trying not to spook him. Hell, he thought, maybe I’m trying not to spook myself.

Alastor’s ears twitched as Husk drew close, and the cat demon froze in place. This was the line, the threshold, the perimeter beyond which there would be no going back. He raised one paw like hand to quaver hesitantly behind the Radio Demon. 

“Al...”

“It’s the anniversary of our first date soon,” Alastor hummed. The cheery tone of his voice was at odds with his uncomfortably stiff stance. Just like the lesser demons who had just enough activity in their lives to beware the Day of Cleansing, Alastor was waiting for something with quiet terror. 

“It is,” Husk agreed, taking another cautious step forwards. “The big number ten, if I’m counting right.” This time when he reached for Alastor, an answering hand clasped his own. 

“The problem with Hell,” Husk opined, “Is that it’s eternal.”

“I suppose so,” Alastor replied, giving the cat demon a questioning look from the corner of his eye. If he didn’t relax soon, he was going to crumble apart from the strain of standing so still, Husk thought. 

“The problem with you, is that you’ve magicked it all up. And now, somehow it’s not going to be long enough. Al, you’re my dear hart, you know that, right?”

Alastor’s breath seemed to seize, leaving him in a sputter of surprised laughter. “You are a smooth talker, my darling. I think maman should have warned me about your type.”

Husk let Alastor pull him into a tight embrace as they swayed together in an almost-dance on the living room rug. 

“Well she’s too late now, I already gotcha!” He grinned lazily at the demon who had somehow stolen his heart all over again. 

“So you do, mon cher,” Alastor replied, placing a kiss precisely between the two heart-shaped marks on his forehead. “And I’m not letting you let me go for anything. Certainly, nothing so inconsequential as our deaths.”

Husk nodded, laughing as his brows twitched at the feeling of Alastor’s hair sliding against them. “I’ll drink to that.”

A shot glass appeared in his hand, and he tipped it back without a thought. The taste of something almost like sugary cereal hit his tongue, and he sputtered and coughed profanity as Alastor swung him around the living room floor once again. 

“YOU GODDAMNED SHIT BASTARD!”

“Yes my dear, but I’m _your_ goddamned shit bastard,” the Radio Demon laughed.


End file.
